COLLEGE BASEBALL: Long Beach State loses rubber game of series to Seattle University 8-3

Head coach Troy Buckley didn't mince words about himself or his Long Beach State baseball team Sunday afternoon.

The Dirtbags dropped the final game of their series against Seattle, 8-3, giving the Redhawks the series win and dropping the team's record to 6-6 after three weeks of the 2013 season.

Seattle came into Long Beach with a 1-8 record (three losses by one run) and playing just its fourth season of Division I baseball, but dominated the Dirtbags most of the weekend. It took a ninth-inning rally Saturday for the Dirtbags to get one win.

On Sunday, Seattle pounded a dozen hits, nine off starter Jon Maciel, played errorless ball and got seven strong innings from left-hander Kyle Doyle. The Dirtbags made 11 flyouts and managed just seven hits, two each by Jeff Yamaguchi and freshman Zack Rivera.

"I'll take responsibility for not having the team ready for the whole weekend," Buckley said. "They outdefended us, outpitched us, outhustled us all weekend. We didn't do enough to win, even if we did get one Saturday.

"We need to get better, and this weekend we went in the opposite direction. We made a lot of flyball outs, (Maciel) left his fastball up and we didn't play catch very well (two errors)."

Rivera singled home Yamaguchi, who had doubled, in the second for a 1-0 lead, but the Redhawks had four straight hits off Maciel in the fourth inning, good for three runs, and three in the sixth, one a leadoff triple by Sean Narby, for two more runs and a 5-1 lead.

The bullpen allowed three walks and two hits in the seventh as Seattle boosted the lead to 8-1 before Yamaguchi singled, Rivera doubled and Alex DeGoti singled for two runs in the seventh.

Rivera was the bright spot, his double a true deep gapper that scored Yamaguchi from first.

"I feel confident up there and made good contact," Rivera, a third baseman in high school playing left field now, said. "I'm just hanging with the (outfield) now, I'll be fine with more reps."

"Right now, we're a .500 team," Buckley said. "We'll find out a lot about this team the next three weeks, about its character, ability to make adjustments and stay mentally tough."

This week, the 49 ers host UCLA in a single game on Tuesday at 6 p.m., then visits Arizona State for a three-game series starting on Friday.